Al-Sayyida al-Mu'iziyya, mainly known as Durzan, was the main consort of Fatimid Caliph

al-Muizz Abu Tamim Ma'ad al-Muizz li-Din Allah ( ar, ابو تميم معد المعزّ لدين الله, Abū Tamīm Maʿad al-Muʿizz li-Dīn Allāh, Glorifier of the Religion of God; 26 September 932 – 19 December 975) was the fourth Fatimid calip ...

and the mother of the Fatimid imam-caliph al-Aziz. She was known as the first patroness of

Fatimid architecture The Fatimid architecture that developed in the Fatimid Caliphate (909–1167 CE) of North Africa combined elements of eastern and western architecture, drawing on Abbasid architecture, Byzantine, Egypt, Ancient Egyptian, Coptic architecture ...

. Durzān also founded the second great Fățimid mosque of

Cairo Cairo ( ; ar, القاهرة, al-Qāhirah, ) is the capital of Egypt and its largest city, home to 10 million people. It is also part of the largest urban agglomeration in Africa, the Arab world and the Middle East: The Greater Cairo metro ...

, a congregational mosque (no longer extant) located in the

Qarafa The City of the Dead, or Cairo Necropolis, also referred to as the Qarafa ( ar, القرافة, al-Qarafa; locally pronounced as ''al-'arafa''), is a series of vast Islamic-era necropolises and cemeteries in Cairo, Egypt. They extend to the nort ...

. Durzan was born in Mahdia, a

Tunisia ) , image_map = Tunisia location (orthographic projection).svg , map_caption = Location of Tunisia in northern Africa , image_map2 = , capital = Tunis , largest_city = capital , ...

n coastal city, as apparently of Arab-Bedouin origin in 344/955. It is said that, because of her beautiful singing, she was also called ''Taghrid'' (Singing As A Bird). Although many Fatimid sources were destroyed, material evidence and literary sources exist that confirm the vastness of her patronage. In 976 AD, Durzan inaugurated the first phase through the building of the

Jami al-Qarafa Mosque The Jami al-Qarafa Mosque or Qarafa Mosque, was the second major mosque built by the Fatimid dynasty in their new capital of Cairo after their conquest of Egypt in 969. It was located in the City of the Dead (Cairo), Qarafa, the great necropolis of ...

with her daughter, Sitt al-Malik. As Cortese and Calinedri argue, this inauguration of the Jami al-Qarafa Mosque marked the first of the two main phases of Fatimid female architectural patronage. Durzan also sponsored a qasr (palace), a bath, a watering pool and a mausoleum. Delia Cortese and Simonetta Calderini have noted Fatimid women’s patronage of public monuments and the link between piety – or religious propaganda – and charity during the delicate early stage of Fatimid rule. In 963 she moved to the newly established

with the entire court of the Caliph, where later she died in 995 AD/385 H*. It is said that when she died in Cairo in 995 AD, her daughter Sitt al-Malik mourned for a month.

Reference

;Sources ;Bibliography * *

Further read

* {{Cite journal, last=Calderini, first=Simonetta, last2=Cortese, first2=Delia, date=2014-01-01, title=5 The Architectural Patronage of the Fāṭimid Queen-Mother Durzān (d. 385/995): An Interdisciplinary Analysis of Literary Sources, Material Evidence and Historical Context, url=https://brill.com/view/book/edcoll/9789004279667/B9789004279667_007.xml, journal=Material Evidence and Narrative Sources, language=en, pages=87–112, doi=10.1163/9789004279667_007 Year of birth missing Year of death missing Women from the Fatimid Caliphate 10th-century people from the Fatimid Caliphate People from Mahdia *385 H refers to Hirja, the Islamic calendar year